ACR+ member the City of Paris held its Council meeting between 20 and 22 November, 2017. Among the most important items on the agenda was the presentation of the local programme for household waste prevention.

The waste prevention programme has been introduced for the first time in 2006, which has helped to reduce generated waste by 6.3%. This programme was then replaced by the local programme for the household waste prevention introduced in 2009, which set a target to reduce generated waste by 7% until 2015. The target was achieved and the amount of generated waste diminished by 31 kilogram per person.

In 2015 the law on Energy Transition for Green was introduced which set a national target to reduce household waste by 10 % between 2010 and 2015. Hence it also set up a target for the City of Paris.

Paris City Council estimates that nearly 75% of the waste bin content could be prevented through actions such as reduction (responsible purchase and consumption), reuse and waste valorisation. As in general the garbage bin consists of packaging waste (37.2%), food waste (22.2%) and paper (13.3%). The remaining part is the occasional waste such as bulky waste which could be prevented through repair, donations, resell or reuse.

Under the updated local programme for the household waste prevention, the city defined six strategic areas which would facilitate reaching the national target on 10% waste reduction. Namely:

Fighting against food waste;

Encouraging local management of bio-waste;

Giving a second life to the occasional waste;

Setting up or reinforcing the actions favouring the waste reduction;

Raising awareness of all stakeholders and promoting their actions aiming to reduce waste;